


Six Very Important Questions Lance Hunter Asked Skye And Coulson

by zauberer_sirin



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Future Fic, Lance Hunter: professional Skoulson shipper, POV Outsider, Romance, Skye and Coulson can't seem to get their shit together, background Hunter/Bobbi, mentions of Audrey, mentions of Miles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-11
Updated: 2014-11-11
Packaged: 2018-02-25 01:27:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2603495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zauberer_sirin/pseuds/zauberer_sirin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lance Hunter wonders how long it will take for these kids to get together. He's not being meddling, he swears. He's a romantic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Six Very Important Questions Lance Hunter Asked Skye And Coulson

**"What the bloody hell is that?"**

Skye rolls down her t-shirt very quickly but he has seen already. Skye frowns furiously at him and yes, okay, but it was an accident, and usually Hunter would be scared of the girl when she gets like this (why does she scare him so much – one thing he hasn't cracked yet) but right now he is too curious.

"You should have checked if there was someone inside," she says, gesturing towards the locker room door.

"You're right and there will many apologies later but first of all, I repeat, _what the hell was that_?"

Skye's frown relaxes a bit, just a bit. "You didn't know I got shot?"

She seems surprised, like there was a memo going around at some point.

He narrows his eyes at the information.

"No."

When he talked to Coulson the Director had said that she was a capable a field agent, he didn't mention she had experience on getting hurt while on a mission. He only had a quick look at the scars but he'd say that's a lot of experience. Too much, where Hunter is concerned. She is too young and too... Skye, to get shot.

"Well, I got shot."

"What happened?" he asks.

"It's complicated," she says. Hunter knows she hopes he would drop it with that. Skye is not the sharing type of girl, but he is not going to let that discourage him. He's really nosy. "The bad guys wanted me shot."

"That's normally what prompts a shooting," he comments.

"No, like I was the objective, actually. You heard about John Garrett and his whole Clairvoyant act?"

"Yeah."

Izzy was the sharing type, and she spent a long time briefing him on the minutae of the last days of SHIELD, as she dramatically put it when she had a couple of beers and a couple of shots of tequila in her. Hunter would normally be a couple of beers ahead of her so he is not sure he got all the details right. But sure, Garrett, he can follow that.

"And you heard about Coulson kind of dying and then kind of coming back from the dead?"

"Somebody tried to explain that one to me," Hunter says. "I didn't get it. It was some sort of SHIELD experiment?"

"Yes, but it was really top level classified and Garrett wanted to know the magical formula... or something?" She frowns. "Look, it's stupid, nevermind."

"No. Why did you get shot?"

"Because Coulson didn't know what SHIELD had done to bring him back," she replies, dropping her gaze a bit.

"Heard about that, too. Creepy." But he still doesn't get it, what it has to do with Skye. "I don't follow you."

"Garrett figured that maybe if I was sort of dying Coulson would... Sorry, it doesn't really make sense when I tell it."

It is complicated. But it's also – what? Did he hear it all right?

His eyes go very wide.

"Are you kidding me?"

That sounds like a plot of... something. Not that he doubts that's how it happened, and he might not have known the bloke for a long time but he has no doubt Coulson would do anything for Skye. It's kind of nice, that idea, if you ask Hunter, despite the fact that every relationship between two people is doomed and there's no love in the world, but that might be just him.

"Nope," Skye says, turning her face a bit. "That's the story of my ugly scars."

He notices something in her gaze. He is not the most attentive person in the world, he realizes this, but he is a sensitive guy, don't take that away from him. And he guesses there's more to why Skye looked so flustered when he caught her changing her clothes. He gets it.

"It's okay, I have scars too," he says. "Look at this one here."

Skye covers her eyes dramatically as he goes to lower the band of his pants.

"Please, _don't_. You dont' have to."

"It's really fun, I got caught in a barbed wire like an idiot and Izzy–"

"What is going on here?" Bobbi says, practically waltzing into the scene because that's his luck, isn't it. She turns to Skye. "Is he being annoying?"

"No of course I wasn't," he protests, although his fingers hooked on the waistband of his pants and underwear don't look too promising, he probably should be grateful Bobbi didn't lead with _perv_. "I was being a proper teammate and reassuring Agent Skye here that we all have battle scars, it's no shame."

Bobbi gives Skye an appraising look. These two haven't spent too much time together yet but Bobbi has this very annoying habit of being instantly likeable to everyone, the snake. He swears, if Skye prefers her to him...

"Of course not," Bobbi tells Skye. "Wanna see mine?"

"That's really not neces–"

Too late, though. Bobbi has already turned around and is now in the process of letting Skye see the messy line on her bare ass from when she got shot in Berlin. Very professional, Bob. Now Skye is going to think they are both hacks. 

 

 

**"Who is Audrey?"**

"Coulson's ex girlfriend," Skye says flatly, not looking up from her computer.

They are in the common area, Skye and Fitz working some – no, Hunter is not even going to try and answer that one. Trip making coffee right now and Mack, well, Mack just got bored of no one playing videogames with him (Hunter admits to being an absolute disaster, he just doesn't see the point) and he is joining the conversation. There's this kind of weird freedom that settles in whenever the Director is away from the base. Skye manages to keep them in line pretty well, the little tyrant, but it's still some sort of we-have-the-house-to-ourselves kind of situation. Perfect to discuss matters of the heart. Which is after all Hunter's favourite subject. He's not even a bit ashamed to admit it. _You are a sap_ was a usual complain of Bobbi. Well, she is missing out on all that.

"Ex– _girlfriend_ ," Hunter repeats, mouth open. He is livid, _livid_ , that no one thought to mention this. "And why wasn't I informed?"

"Because we knew you'd get annoying," Skye says.

Hunter can see Fitz and Trip quietly nodding in agreement. Mack is mouthing _don't_ at him.

"I'm not annoying. I take an interest in the lives of my colleagues. I'm a human being."

"No, it's being annoying, definitely."

"I'm with Skye on this one."

"Et tu, Mack?"

But he thinks about it for a moment. Coulson's ex- _girlfriend_.

The mysterious surprise trip to Portland makes sense now. And so does Skye's behaviour these last few days. He sits next to her on the back of couch, proceeds to be even more annoying.

"That's why you have been pissed off at Coulson the past couple of days? Because he was going to go to see her?"

Skye's face twists in actual surprise and annoyance, not any front she is trying to put to protect her feelings.

"Of course not, you freak," she says. "I was pissed at him because he had been hiding the fact that he was alive from that poor woman. It's awful."

"It is?"

"Imagine if someone you loved did that to you. I would never forgive Coulson."

Hunter thinks the choice of words is kind of revealing. And they all know how Skye feels about people keeping secrets from her, specially people named Phil Coulson specifically.

"Who is she, anyway?" he asks, looking around. "Do you guys know her?"

"I've met her," Trip says, calmly sipping on his coffee as if this weren't amazing news. "Fitz and Simmons too."

"Yeah, nice lady," Fitz says.

What kind of friends Skye has? Hunter is really heartbroken at this lack of support. He remembers how Mack refused to stop meeting Bobbi for drinks and stuff when she divorced Hunter and Hunter asked him to pick a side. He wasn't really _serious_ about the request, he's not a twat, but it would have been nice of Mack to offer. Hunter is going to make sure Skye has better luck.

"She plays classical music," Trip adds.

"Posh," Hunter comments.

At that Skye curls her lips in a grimace of disapproval.

"That's not fair," she says.

Of course she is the type to actually defend the ex-girlfriend. It's a wild world, sweetheart.

"Hey, I'm offering my services as the bad guy because I know you would never do that."

"Hunter, I don't have time for your fantasies," Skye says, harsher than she usually is – and she is a rough, sharp diamond of a girl most of the time anyway – because she is hiding something, isn't she. "Some of us actually work here for real."

He raises an ineffectual eyebrow. No respect for her seniors.

"I wasn't being mean!" He was. But he had a point. "You don't need to fear a bit of competition. Our boy Coulson – get a couple of beers in him and he's salt of the earth."

"You're being annoying, I'm calling Bobbi."

That works.

 

 

**"Are you okay?"**

Skye looks up. She was poking and proding at her cast, wincing. Hunter smiles – he does that. Bobbi used to say soldiers make even worse patients than doctors and that Hunter made the worst of them all. He sometimes misses Bobbi taking care of him when he got hurt. Which was quite often. He wonders if he might be a not-so-good agent.

Skye tries to put on her game face, but it's a bit off. It's been a bit off since she came back.

"I'm fine," she says, the international code for not-okay. She is sitting on her bunk bed, legs-crossed. Man, she makes him feel old sometimes.

"Do you want me to sign it?" Hunter offers.

"How old are you?"

But he has managed to make her smile. She kind of creeped up on him, this one. He didn't imagine it would matter to him so much, that he was able to make this girl smile. That's where she most reminds him of Izzy and where he misses Izzy the most – Skye took him by surprise as well.

"Are you really all right?" he asks again. He knows he doesn't seem like the most supportive of teammates and he is not the one Skye would go to with her problems, but he could be that person if he let her. He's not completely hopeless when it comes to this.

Skye seems to know or notice this, she gives him an honest look. She looks raw and tired and sad and she lets him see that. Hunter thinks she is cute. She can be cute sometimes.

"I'll be fine," she tells him. "It's over now. He... he's not going to hurt anyone ever again."

No one has really asked about the details. The team just knows Skye's father is out of the picture. The team just knows the wounds Skye, Coulson and May came back with. Skye's face taught them not to ask, at least not just yet.

Hunter considers her for a moment. He's thick enough to just ask. But something stops him. He realizes he needs to be gentle right now.

"Am I interrupting?" Coulson asks as he knocks on the door.

Skye shakes her head slightly, without even asking Hunter, looking the Director in the eye.

Hunter takes in the image.

They both look like fresh hell. Skye's arm. The bruises on Coulson's neck drawing the clear shape of a hand. No one knows exactly what happened in that place – Agent May probably does, since she was the one to find them, but Hunter is not about to ask her about something this serious – but the aftereffects are pretty telling in themselves.

"Come on, guys, cheer up," he tells them. They need Hunter to be himself right now. "It's not such a drama. One time Bobbi's father –"

"Not now, Hunter," Coulson says. It sounds more like a request than usual. Softer.

"Can I have a moment alone with Director Coulson please?" Skye asks.

They are doing the thing again. The thing where they look at each other and it seems like the rest of the world is suddenly not there. Hunter gets that. He used to have that, he thinks. He misses that too. 

"Sure," he tells them.

For once he doesn't have a witty quip to throw at them. There's something delicate about the scene.

He leaves them alone. They deserve it. They probably have a lot to talk about. He hopes they'll be okay, he hopes Skye was telling the truth and she is going to be all right, eventually. He hopes a lot of things for these two. Hunter doesn't know how to explain it. They are his guys.

He turns around and he walks away just as Coulson sits on the bed next to Skye, close to her, his face serious and soft and intimate.

 

 

**"Have you lost your mind?"**

"Hello, Agent Hunter, I'm Phil Coulson, _Director of SHIELD_. Would you care to rephrase your question?"

"Don't try to be humorous, Coulson. You're very bad at it."

He turns to the screen once more, the team gathered around the strangers in one of the interrogation rooms. He had heard of the Rising Tide. It had taken him a bit to connect the dots and find out Skye had been a part of the group. He didn't, connect the dots, actually, Coulson told him. He also told him about Skye's old boyfriend Miles Lydon. The same one sitting in the middle of a SHIELD facility, telling the team all about the Rising Tide's brush with HYDRA.

"The Rising Tide have been helping SHIELD for months," Coulson is saying. "Of course we are offering them a safe place to lie low for now. Once they have been properly debriefed, of course."

"I don't approve of this," Hunter says.

Coulson throws him a dismissive look. 

He also doesn't approve of how familiar Skye seems to be with the guy. Even on the screen he doesn't like it. He knows Coulson is never going to protest – he and Skye are pot and kettle and there's a possibility they both might die alone despite Hunter's unfairly-unappreciated efforts – but Hunter feels like he should stand up for his guy. That's what friends do. He's very sentimental after all.

He also doesn't approve of how Skye's ex-boyfriend looks.

"Well, he definitely is hot," he says, trying to at least get a reaction. "I'm very sorry."

Coulson turns his face towards him a bit, the eyebrow barely raised. He's not a good sport these days.

He looks so wound up today. More than usual, if that's even possible.

"It's okay," Hunter tells him, all benevolent and wise. "I used to get antsy whenever Bobbi's exes came to visit."

"It's not like that," Coulson replies, not looking at him.

"It isn't?"

Not even Coulson sounds convinced. Maybe Hunter has already worn him down. Izzy used to say he was very good at wearing down people. Nah, he's just charming. He's going with charming, _gradually_ charming. But Coulson seems to have accepted his defeat on this. He and Skye have been acting weird lately – more than usual, Hunter likes their usual blend of unnecessary weirdness, it's very entertaining, the poor naive souls. But this? He doesn't like this. They have been awkward for weeks now and this whole Miles Lydon thing, Hunter doesn't like it.

"You're actually worried," Hunter realizes. It wrong foots him, he's used to teasing Coulson, he didn't mean to strike a chord. He was just having fun. "Coulson?"

"Not in the way you imply," he says.

Hunter senses he wants to say more. 

Jokes aside he thinks he does the man some good, his company. He wishes he could take the Director for a drink right now. If it were late at night and they were alone in his office Hunter's prodding would probably be more successful. The guy needs someone to talk to.

"You don't trust the guy."

"Skye can take care of herself," Coulson says, a bit defensively. "But – I was there the last time. She got hurt."

"That guy hurt her?" Hunter asks. He shrugs. "That girl's luck with men..."

"You can say that," Coulson replies, which, for Coulson's standards is almost a full confession.

"Maybe it's time someone did something about that?" Hunter says.

Coulson doesn't reply. He didn't expect him.

He almost – almost! – seems to be thinking about it.

That has to be some kind of progress. 

 

 

**"You realize there are cameras all over the building?"**

It's a rethoric question.

He is grinning at the flustered faces. Skye's in particular, she _really_ is rather cute sometimes.

"We were just –" Coulson starts, without much conviction. He hands are still somehow resting right over Skye's hips, but much more modestly now. A moment before Hunter came in to fetch the two of them those hands were almost outside of the PG-rated realm. Coulson looks down at them in surprise, his touch on her body, but doesn't look like he considers stopping. It's fun seeing Coulson like that, knowing that he has been caught in a situation where his legendary self-control slipped.

Skye tries to go on: "There was this explosion and he thought –"

"I thought she was dead," Coulson says, like an excuse, like he is entitled to his reaction. Well, they all thought Skye was dead. But they didn't run to put their tongues in her mouth as soon as they found out she was not.

"And he got shot and I –"

Coulson gives her a shy smile. "She was worried."

So sweet and unprofessional. Hunter feels proud of them. He thought old Phil here didn't have it in him. And technically it was Skye who started it, flung herself against him and grabbed his neck and attacked his mouth without mercy, but let's give the Director a win. His lips look red and wonderfully bruised. He's going to give Skye _that win_.

"We were just–"

"It's not what it looks like?"

They make pathetic gestures with their hands, trying to diffuse attention somehow. They are awkward and hopeless and weird, Hunter hopes they don't mess it up with their lack of skills. They also look pretty excited and pretty scared. Aw, young love, he thinks. Things were getting ridiculous anyway. They have put Hunter through enough already, he was beginning to lose his patience. 

Skye gives up trying to explain or cover it. She shrugs and when Coulson tries to take his hand away from her waist she drops her own to catch it, lacing their fingers together discreetly.

Hunter is just really glad this was all caught on tape. Perfect blackmail material. What can he say, he is a romantic.

 

 

**"But do I have to sit with Bobbi?"**

"You sit wherever you want, Hunter, this is not an official thing," Skye tells her. "There are no seating arrangements."

She is sitting on Coulson's desk. She said something about reencoding or reprogramming something in the controls to the office screen, Hunter is not even going to try to remember. Very workaholic of her. Coulson is kind of doing his thing at the other end of the room, also with the excessive working ethic. Hunter doesn't even know why he is friends with these two.

"But–"

"It's just a private dinner," Skye adds. "To celebrate SHIELD is no longer a terrorist organization? To celebrate we are starting the Welcome Wagon again?"

"But you're getting married, right?" he teases her.

It's kind of a running joke among the team. Fine, not among the team, just him, he's the only one making that joke. He wonders why it hasn't caught on yet. Neither Skye nor Coulson have taken the bait so far. Skye rolls her eyes a lot. Not very attractive.

They are way too casual about the whole thing. They were much more dramatic before they started sleeping together. Hunter thought this was going to be a lot more fun – _They are private people_ , Trip said to him once. But that's just boring.

"You know, I was already married at your age," he tells Skye.

"Look how well that went."

"And Director, you are well past your prime, putting it delicatedly. You should grab this opportunity."

Coulson walks up to them, finally, stops pretending not to listen to their conversation.

Coulson is in corporeal presence but Hunter notices how he always seem conspicuously absent in mind and soul whenever someone comments on his relationship with Skye. He doesn't pronounce himself. Hunter thinks sometimes he looks _smug_ about it, the cad. Even when Hunter manages to coax him into one of their drinking evenings – rare occassion, because the Director's nights are sort of busy nowadays – Coulson is a tomb on the issue. Only his face betrays there's something different, his insanely-happy-looking face. He's pretty cute, too. 

But not now. Now he just looks really bothered by Hunter. He is just this close to declaring a time off, kicking him out of the office and having one of his make-out sessions with Skye he believes the team knowns nothing about. Oh the team knows about it. They all know what "everybody out of my office" means. They know _everybody_ doesn't really mean everybody.

"Did you actually want something, other than once again reiterate your dislike for your ex-wife, which we all know is a front anyway?" 

Hunter is appalled, appalled he swears, that Coulson could be so insensitive. And why does he even assume Hunter still loves Bobbi, that's another thing – he gets a vivid flashback, a couple of months ago, swinging a particularly good lager, a Samuel Adams if he remembers correctly, and him saying to Coulson _I still love her, you know_. That might be where Coulson got the idea.

"I still get to make the best man's speech, right?"

He gives the both of them his best puppy grin. Coulson looks at Skye for guidance. She rolls her eyes. Izzy once told him that love meant being annoyed at people together, but Izzy had very belligerent girlfriends, she might not have been a great role model. If it's true Coulson and Skye have the being annoyed at people together down to a science. They might even manage not to die alone.

There's a knock on the door. Bobbi. Perfect.

"Director. About tonight's dinner. Do I have to sit next to Hunter?" she asks. Well, that's pretty rude, if you ask him.

Skye drops the tablet on the desk with a dramatic thud. Coulson walks to the door.

"Everybody out of my office."


End file.
